After some technical difficulties (ie. I’m a noob and it took some time to find out how to replace the build with a newer version on Ssteam), the game is finally live!

Join us to see Hollywood at a funny angle :)

It's happening, peoples, it's really happening! :)

Cattle Call will be available in the store this evening (Europe) or morning (NA).

The game is priced at 9.99 EUR / 11.99 USD with a 10% launch discount for the first week.

Anyone in this group who doesn't buy the game will be banned instantly (just joking, though we'd still be honored and happy if you could purchase it :)

Thanks again guys for the enthusiasm and support you've been showing towards the game!

Dearest Peoples!

(Unless Valve rejects our submission for some reason) Cattle Call will be released on Steam EA on 20 November!

Our massive 2-me(a)n team have been working on the game since early 2016 and I must admit there were times when I thought this moment would never come.

But it's here and it’s a cathartic, yet nerve-wrecking and downright scary experience. I therefore predict that some pubs in our vicinity will witness a massive rise in beer consumption in the next few days.

Thank you for your flattering interest and support and we very much look forward to making the game even better in the EA phase - together with you!

A toast (from my favorite TV character ever) to you all!

It may seem a bit premature, given that the game has not even been released yet, but I’d still like to share some post-launch thoughts/plans with you, so you can look at these things from a funny angle, too.



The film- and TV industry and the professional + personal lives of the actors is a humongous subject matter for a two-men team. And while we worked our assess off in the last three years, there are still plenty of things to extend, improve, balance, polish, russian, italian, and so on.

And even beyond perfecting the current content, there are countless features (smaller and bigger) that can be added to Cattle Call. The only limitation to implement them is our imagination. And time. And of course money. But aside from these, nothing else.



We don’t want to decide about the additions ourselves though. What we’ll do is to set out plans and priorities on the basis of your feedback. Hell, we may even vote because voting is a thing these days.

Obviously, the very first updates will be about fixing any major problems you may encounter and about rectifying any major flaws that might frustrate you.
After these though, there are a few things that’ll be implemented in the game as soon as possible, even I get lynched in retribution (in that case, they will take a bit more time, of course). These are:

• In-game Awards (Oscars, Emmys, etc. – with lawsuit-proof names, of course)
  
• Steam Achievements (because everyone needs a little extra motivation)
  
• Additional Languages (because everyone needs the additional income or at least we do)

Apart from these, we have quite a few other ideas as well but as we’ll live in an anarcho-syndicalist commune with you, you’ll definitely be able to expand or even shorten this list.

These are our current, “secondary” plans in an order of importance:

• Modding Tools: by releasing the Event Editor and the Character Editor, you’ll be able to freely modify the actors’ parameters and write new events
  
• Story/scenario mode: we feel the game would benefit from having a light Story Mode next to the current Free Mode
  
• More Diverse Actors Pack: by creating new character parts, we can increase the variety of characters (almost) infinitely
  
• Steam Leaderboards: who’s the goldest of all Ari Golds?
  
• Hiring Staff: hire and fire agents, set the goals and let them do their thing
  
• Commercial Actors Division: create a Commercial Division and fill it up with clients. Go on to book them on commercials. Some commercials may elevate your actors to such heights of fame that they can drop commercials and focus on more serious acting roles
  
• Voice Actors’ Division: this could actually fit into the current system quite easily

Thank you for your attention, ladies and gentlemen, and we look forward to making Cattle Call great again together with you soon!

An “as realistic as it can be without excluding more casual players” setting based on extensive research of the movie and TV industry.



Elements like movie and TV show genre occurrence, gender- and ethnic diversity (or the lack of it) in roles, actor quotes, contract terms, predatory producers, etc. all reflect real life.

Your agency, the actors, the directors and producers also have various stats stored in the game, so hardcore sim fanatics can analyze the hell out of them.



‘Cattle Call’ spans many years and every new campaign works with randomly generated movies, TV shows and roles which guarantees a very high replayability as well.

Actors appearing in good movies means Fame boost, Morale boost and possibly Wallet boost, if the contract had a backend bonus (better movies have a better chance of smashing it at the box office).



How can you make sure you submit your actors to good movies? Aside from determining the quality of the script, it’s also worth profiling the director. While brilliant auteurs can also turn even a cringeworthy script into a decent movie, the incompetent ones are able to turn the script of a „Bug’s Life” into „Human Centipede”...



If you fail to do a good job and your actors do not earn enough money or you place them in god-awful movies, they will get depressed and leave you once their contract expires. And make no mistake, let a sensitive artist down once and you’ll never be able to sign him/her again.



Awards also give a massive boost to the actor’s career (especially major ones). Needless to say that bad movies or series will not be considered for any award no matter how good your actors performed in them.

Dearest Peoples!

Unfortunately, Cattle Call proves to be such an extremely realistic simulation of the world of movies and TV that it also faithfully follows one of the industry’s standard practice: “release date delays”.

Bad joking aside, we sincerely apologize and beg for your forgiveness but we have to delay the release of the game until 22, November.

Even though it’s another common practice (in this case, a common practice of the games industry, though some movies also feel half-completed for sure) to release games that are practically unplayable because of total bug infestation (and then carpet bomb players with critical patches every day), this is not something we’re willing to do.

Early Access or not, we want to make sure everything that is already in the game works well and without any serious anomalies. Right now, the game does not meet these criteria because it still has a couple of issues that we consider “major” and these have to be ironed out.

We also wanted to give "the ironing" a safe timeframe, so we won’t have to make embarrassing announcements like this ever again, hence the 4 weeks delay. Aside from eliminating the aforementioned anomalies, this extended period will also give us a chance of further balancing and fine tuning the game, which will further improve the general quality of Cattle Call.

Once again, we are terribly sorry for keeping you waiting and we hope it won’t kill your interest in the title.

To compensate you for the delay and to alleviate the urge to kill, the game will be sold at a 20% launch discount for the first week after release.

While you cannot directly develop your ingame persona, your actions and decisions are reflected in your skill ratings.

Your actor wins a role – your Knowledge Skill will increase (sadly, it works the other way too: lose an audition and your skill will slightly diminish).



You successfully negotiated the role contract with the studio? Your Negotiation Skill will increase (screw up the contract and your rating will be screwed, too).

One of your clients want to come out of the closet because he/she cannot handle the pressure anymore but you advise them not to do it because their chances of winning leading movie roles would lessen? Your Personal Skill will be reduced but your Knowledge Skill will increase.





Your skill ratings have an effect on various aspects of the game, so don’t neglect them. For example, if you have a low Personal Skill, you’ll have a hard time in persuading your clients to do virtually anything you suggest.

Increase your Knowledge Skill and you will accurately evaluate any script by reading the first few sentences (and you won’t have to pay those bloody consultants anymore).

Brandish a low Negotiation Skill in a contract negotiation and the producer will eat you alive (unless he/she has an even lower rating).



As you make more money, your Reputation will also rise. And talents represented by more reputable agencies have an edge on fellow thesps at auditions. Fair? No. Realistic? Absolutely. Its a simulation game after all.

The dozens of unique stats actors, directors, producers, and your character possess make room for thousands of potential stat combinations. This creates a perfect „environment” for hundreds of interesting, elevating and sometimes frustrating or even infuriating RANDOM EVENTS



Some of those events will require your decision, others just happen. They have one thing is in common though: events always have an effect on one or many elements in the game.

- An actor with low Professionalism and higher Confidence may flip out at an audition if he/she doesn’t win the role. This will result in a Fame drop and a new, „Labelled unprofessional” Personal Info, which will count as a malus at every audition from that time on. If the actor’s relevant stats reach a certain level later, he/she may shed this „scarlet letter”.



- Book your confident actor on a movie with a mean director (low Personal skill) and you can expect some interesting things to happen during filming.

Some events will have different endings depending on the protagonist’s attributes. E.g.

- One of your actors want to try his/her hands on stand-up comedy and ask for your advice. If you get behind the idea, the actor with high Humor, Improvisation and decent Confidence will succeed (=Fame, Morale and Confidence increases).

If the client you encouraged not tick these boxes, he/she will be mercilessly booed off the stage (Fame, Morale, Confidence do a deep-sea dive).



Events like this can also trigger a chain reaction if you are lucky/unlucky:

Actor fails as a stand-up performer - Morale goes down - low morale combined with certain Personality - chance that the actor becomes a drug addict - drug addict doing something scandalous - rehab and the actor will be unavailable for work for several months.

A bunch of events as aperitives:

- Method actor freaks out co-stars with his/her extreme ways to get into character



- Film gets a new director who fires your client because he/she has his/her own candidate
- Name actor gets a highly lucrative voice acting role in an offensive animation film (will you accept the offer?)
- WWE star offers you money to turn him into an action star within half a year
- Actor who changed body type to „Muscular” by your advice becomes a steroid addict. He then destroys a night club and gets arrested. Will you bail him out or let the musclehead rot in jail?

While actors evolve and devolve as they get older, they also develop through filming.



Directors and showrunners with high Knowledge skill will help actors grow. Tying them with bush league filmmakers, on the other hand, may drive the thesps straight to „retrograde city”.



Besides, you can also have a Chat with your clients and suggest that they transform their body type, learn new special skills or enroll to an acting school and focus on a certain genre to enhance those genre-related skills and to enhance their career perspective.

If they have solid „Commitment” and you have high enough „Personal skill”, they’ll take your advice. If not, they are likely to suggest that you shove your advice in a black, damp place.